The old mantra about the three most important factors for a shop’s success – location, location and location – has been borne out by a new mathematical model. It could help retailers pinpoint lucrative sites for their stores.
Physicist Pablo Jensen from the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Lyon, France, analysed location records for more than 8500 retail outlets in the city. He found that the shops formed clusters, with shops such as butchers and delicatessens in one group, for example, and laundromats and bookstores in another. Stores of the same group seemed to attract each other, while stores from different groups repelled…
